COMMUNITY REPORT 2ND QUARTER, 2011 | ISSUE 18
Welcome Message
Dear Members, Contributors, Users organization, so new infrastructure the few Free software communities of KDE software, and Friends, in the form of sprints.kde.org was that have sorted out this very well, taken for a first real-world test- but this all is only possible with The past quarter saw the biggest drive. The new sprints.kde.org active people who want to get a KDE developer sprint ever. In early website shows two things: group of developers together, and June, about 40 KDE contributors developer sprints have been with our loyal supporting came together in the Swiss Alps to institutionalized in KDE, at the members, both corporate and work on a variety of same time, the organization of private. These sprints, the resulting topics—Multimedia, Semantic them has become easier, and stronger bonds within and outside Desktop, Development more scalable. When I joined the of our community have become Environment and the underlying board a few years ago, there was an essential part of the KDE KDE platform. With 4 sprints co- the incidental sprint, but I development process and the located, some organizational remember well how much work it foundation of our commmunity. muscle was needed, but at the ended up being. Worth the effort, same time, having this many but non-trivial from an Enjoy reading our report of the developers from various disciplines organizational point of view. Now, second quarter of 2011. in one house at the same time a few years and tens of sprints proved to be invaluable. Cross- later, there's a developer sprint Sebastian Kügler (on behalf of the pollination took place across about every three weeks, and KDE e.V. Board) subprojects in the KDE community, we're working with well-structured but also with several people from setups. There's mentoring for those other Free software communities, who'd like to get a sprint notably the GTK/GNOME and organized, as well as funds Zeitgeist camps. Feedback was available to invite people based on exchanged between different their value for the project, not groups, and patches flew across based on their financial KDE borders. Of course, a bigger possibilities nor where they are meeting requires more located. KDE is probably among
Contents Welcome Message 1 Representing the KDE project: KDE e.V. 2 Presenting KDE e.V. administrative staff KDE Activities 4 Recaps from KDE sprints, trade shows, and other activities New Members 8 Financial Report and KDE e.V. Board 9 REPRESENTING THE KDE PROJECT : KDE e.V.
There is KDE with thousands of participants and Claudia: Initially, I worked part time for KDE e.V. and members, and also KDE e.V., which supports overall part time for Wikimedia Deutschland e.V. for a couple activities and promotion of KDE by managing of months. I came in contact with KDE e.V. through a organizational procedures. KDE e.V. was established friend of mine who was Wikimedia Deutschland's because the growth of KDE popularity required KDE to executive director back then. He offered me a job and have an legal organizational entity that deals with introduced me to Klaas and Sebas, KDE e.V. board legal and financial works exclusively. members. They were looking into hiring someone to help grow KDE e.V. and professionalize the work of KDE e.V. consists of a Board of Directors and staff. the association. After a couple of months, they offered Members of the Board of Directors are located in me a fulltime job, and that was that :) different countries, while KDE e.V. has its main office in Berlin, Germany. The office is used by Claudia Rauch, What are your main tasks? How do you like it? Any the business manager and currently two new interns, advantages and difficulties? Inu Kim and Florian Wilhelm. Claudia: My main tasks are organizing our community Let's meet them here through our Quarterly Report events, like Akademy, the Desktop Summit and and hear their motivations and passion for working developer sprints, running the office and helping to with KDE e.V. raise funds for KDE e.V. through our supporting membership programs. I also go to FLOSS conferences and expos like FOSDEM and Linuxtag to Claudia Rauch represent KDE together with other community members, and to establish new contacts with other Would you introduce yourself? Free Software projects and companies.
Claudia: My name is Claudia Rauch; I run the KDE e.V. I like my job a lot because I work in an international office in Berlin. I've been working as KDE e.V.'s environment with a group of creative and friendly, business manager since March 2008. Prior to that, I welcoming people. And, this job never gets boring as worked as a Product Manager for a company that my task are quite diverse. offers professional education. I have an M.A. in American studies. One of the biggest challenges in my job is that I mostly work with a remote team, over different time zones. In the beginning, I really had to get used to communicating via mailing lists and IRC as opposed to just walking over to the desk of a colleague for a quick chat ;) I am a social person, so I make sure that I get to meet our awesome community members as often as possible. Thankfully, I get to attend some of our events, so I see a lot of KDE people throughout the year.
Inu Kim Could you introduce yourself?
Inu: Hey I'm Inu, from South Korea. I've studied International Management in Japan and came to Germany for an exchange program. I decided to stay for a little longer while I do an internship. Claudia Rauch How did you come in contact with KDE e.V. and what How did you come in contact with KDE e.V. and what was your motivation to work? was your motivation to work here? Inu: I was looking for an internship at a non-profit Representing the KDE project : KDE e.V. (continued)
How did you come into contact with KDE e.V. and what was your motivation to work?
Florian: I was looking for a nice job until the semester begins and found a hint on netzpolitik.org (a well known german blog about politics and the internet) that KDE e.V. was looking for interns. I applied and was accepted.
So, what KDE does related to free software is your field of interest?
Florian: Yes, i like the idea of free software and have used it mainly since 2007. I think it would be great if we can one day replace all nonfree software with free alternatives. We're not quite there yet, but i think we're on a good way.
Inu Kim What are your main tasks and how do you like it? Any organization or institute rather than a big corporation. advantages and difficulties? During my search on the Internet, I saw that KDE e.V. is a non-profit organzation in the field of free software Florian: The main task so far is to help on the "join the that was looking for an intern to participate in game" campaign, which offers an easy way to organizing the Desktop Summit and business support the KDE e.V. I also help prepare the Desktop communication. I thought I could get hands-on Summit which will be an event for contributors to free experience with non-profit organization work as well desktop. It's an advantage that I can help free as organizing a conference. And here I am now.
What are your main tasks and how do you like it? Any advantages and difficulties?
Inu: As I've mentioned, at the moment I'm helping with organizing and preparing Desktop Summit 2011. I mostly provide information on the Wiki and the DS webpage for the participants so that things can go smoothly without a noise. As well I'm working on the Quarterly Report, collecting articles and photos. By working at KDE e.V., as I expected, I see how actual work is done in a non-profit organization which is different from corporations that make profit by selling their products. Also I get to learn about free software. We are a very small group working at an actual office together, but that's what makes me feel more excited Florian Wilhelm about the Summit. I'm looking forward to meeting the software in general, which is a big plus. Anotherbenefit people I've been working with virtually at the Summit. will be that I can attend desktop summit, which I'm really looking forward to. There aren't any serious difficulties until now and i hope there will be none at Florian Wilhelm all :) Could you introduce yourself? Thank you very much for your time and telling us Florian: Hello, my name is Florian, I am 22 years old, about you and KDE e.V. worked as a programmer for three years and will begin studying computer science soon. KDE Activities
Developer Sprints was able to digest a huge file with KDE UX MEETING, BERLIN 100,000 entries and was still fast. For the future, this means that 15-17 APRIL KDE EDU SPRINT, vocabulary data can be acquired Peter Sikking BILBAO quickly, directly from Ambaradan. 7-10 April Further ways of co-operation with The KDE UX sprint in the mid-April other KDE projects were discussed; was a lively meeting of KDE Aleix Pol & Anne-Marie we plan to come back to these Mahfouf developers, a variety of points step by step. Coding work (interaction) designers and was done too. Parley became usability folks. m+mi works The KDE Edu team gathered in more polished, Kalzium has a new contributed to the sprint with two Bilbao (Basque Country, Spain) to developer working on experts. work together in the KDE Edu improvements and we looked at project, to see how to make it some Step and KTouch bugs. We THE WORLD COULD better and more useful to anyone talked about using more libraries who wants to use KDE for learning. and planned a framework to REALLY DO WITH MORE This year we had some regroup some of our programs. newcomers like some new Another big topic was promotion TRUST AMONG ALL developers for Rocs, KStars and of KDE-Edu. Related to that, we Step; we also met some old timers started updating and improving SIDES. like Marble, Rocs, Parley and our website. Many interesting topics were KAlgebra maintainers. We had some guests too—some discussed such as: We shared our work with Sabine KDE Spain members joined us to • What does it take to bring the from Vox Humanitatis (working give us a hand with hacking and same application to different with languages in less resourced coordination, and our new website platforms, e.g. desktop, tablet and cultures) and Bèrto from the designer paid a visit too. mobile touch devices? Ambaradan project (making dictionaries for those languages). We worked on different stuff: we • Is it great that interaction Vox Humanitatis promotes the use had the open day where we designers can build a UI of Parley and KHangMan as Free displayed what we were working (prototype) themselves with Software for languages. We talked on, we worked on specific features languages like QML? about how we can interact better, in some applications, we worked on organizational topics like this for example how to improve the • We looked at Calligra for screen KVTML format that we use for year's GSoC, and the new website structure and looks. layouts of windows, toolbars, language applications. inspectors for office suite applications. Even the ms‑office An export of Ambaradan data into All in all it was a great week for ribbon came up (Celeste Lyn Paul the KVTML2 format was done KDE Edu. We got a lot of hacking hit the nail on the head with "icon successfully by Vox Humanitatis. done, a lot of new ideas came up, puke"). We quickly found out that This means that Parley and other we had great food and interesting the problem is highly complicated, applications can retrieve the data conversations. with a lot of variables involved. from Ambaradan directly without Contact: [email protected] or intermediate conversion. Parley [email protected] • Overarching theme for the three days: developer–designer ALL IN ALL IT WAS A GREAT WEEK FOR KDE EDU. relationships. The world could WE GOT A LOT OF HACKING DONE, A LOT OF really do with more trust between all sides. NEW IDEAS CAME UP, WE HAD GREAT FOOD AND http://blog.mmiworks.net/ INTERESTING CONVERSATIONS.
KDE eV Community Report | Issue 17 | 1st Quarter, 2011 ev.kde.org/reports 4 OWNCLOUD SPRINT, STUTTGART In order to make the installation of Platform11 meeting, which was extensions straightforward, we held in early June in Switzerland. 15-18 APRIL have created ownCloud Apps: an online application sharing platform Arthur Schiwon KDE PROMO MEETING, that will be easily accessible via SOUTHAMPTON For four days, starting on Friday the Open Collaboration Services April 15th, about half a dozen souls (OCS) API, that also acts as the 6-8 MAY backend for GetHotNewStuff. gathered in the hive01 Justin Kirby headquarters in Stuttgart. The goal of this very first ownCloud sprint We warmly thank KDE e.V. for sponsoring the sprint! We had a lot The KDE Promo team wrapped up was to discuss, plan and of course a busy weekend at their sprint in hack on the web services project. of fun, agreed on plenty of topics, and hacked on countless features Southampton, England. The group set out with an aggressive agenda To kickoff, we had a brainstorming and techniques, making the ownCloud sprint a full success. and accomplished many of their session and discussion of the goals. topics that were to be dealt with over the following days. We Just 5 more minutes to world domination. The first item on the agenda was extensively debated fundamental promoting Join the Game, the things concerning the future membership campaign that PLASMA/ TOKAMAK 5 MEETING, directions of ownCloud. encourages individuals to support NIJMEGEN KDE financially. In preparation for this promotional push, they've JULY centralized the existing artwork Sebastian Kügler relating to Join the Game on the Community Wiki page. The page Tokamak, the recurring sprint of already contains several web the Plasma team, took place in banners in various sizes which April this year, in Nijmegen in the community members can use to ownCloud Netherlands. The team gathered advertise the campaign, including for a whopping total of 10 days to a newly created animated GIF that work on improved Releasing ownCloud 1.2 desktop defaults for OwnCloud 1.2 is the next the 4.7 release, on maintenance version of the Plasma Active ownCloud 1.x series. It includes targeting the several bugfixes. If you are a user mobile/embedded of ownCloud 1.1 you should space, and on upgrade to ownCloud 1.2. Since planning the next the team decided on a new code- generation of base at this sprint, ownCloud 1.2 libplasma. will also be the final release before ownCloud 2.0 enters the wild. Hackers from all over the world KDE Promo Probably the most important work gathered, discussed, was done on refactoring designed and is quite cool. This is also the placet ownCloud's initial concept and hacked frantically on all aspects of o find the source files for flyers to work by Jakob Sack. These Plasma. While many things have hand out at conferences and trade changes will help to make the been implemented right away, the shows. codebase clearer, easier to meeting provided an excellent maintain and a lot more flexible. opportunity to determine which The discussion continued to the ownCloud will be easy to extend direction the developers want to next day. There was a big push on with additional applications and take with Plasma. Tokamak5 also the redesign of the official site to plugins. provided useful input for the make it easier for potential
KDE eV Community Report | Issue 17 | 1st Quarter, 2011 ev.kde.org/reports 5 supporters to understand. Much of The sprint the technical work was already in achieved a lot place; there was a debate over and was a great page content as we worked to opportunity for describe the initiative clearly and some long-time concisely to site visitors. Another collaborators to major focus of the day was on finally meet in planning for the Desktop Summit person. in Berlin. An IRC meeting was held with some of our GNOME http://dot.kde.or colleagues to discuss the schedule g/2011/06/08/w WebWorld of upcoming press releases and ebworld-2011- areas where we would need to building-next- coordinate with the event kde-web bringing a healthy mix of creativity organizers. and pragmatism. Topics that were discussed were technical, design On the last morning, after having and promotion issues facing the completed at least five iterations of kde.org website and the UserBase the Join the Game site contents, the (and, to a lesser extent, the other KDE PLATFORM 11 SPRINT, team reached consensus on the KDE wikis). home page text and layout. The RANDA fruits of our effort, along with The UserBase team looked at 1-7 JUNE much help from Emil Sedgh and technical issues with discussion Nuno Pinheiro on the design and pages, archived pages and Sebastian Kügler artwork, was unveiled at this "translation memory" that assists year's LinuxTag on the one year translators by improving translation In early June 2011, a sizable group anniversary of the creation of this guidance based on previous of KDE hackers met high up in the important campaign. edits.They also updated instructions Swiss Alps. In Randa, four co- for editing pages, and tested located meetings took place to Overall the weekend was quite anonymous editing to see if this further KDE technologies. One of productive and a lot of fun. Thank could be enabled so that it would these groups, Platform 11, had as its you to Southampton’s School of be easier for people to make their goal to take the KDE development Electronics and Computer Science first contributions. They also platform to its next level. This group (ECS) for hosting the sprint, and for modified the sidebar to make the consisted of about 25 people who giving us nice lunches each day. In layout easier to use and adjusted work on and around kdelibs, the particular we'd like to thank Joyce the wiki background. They cracked build-system, distributions, and 3rd Lewis of ECS for making all the on with polishing up the wiki party developers, and was intended arrangements. experience, tidying up codetags to represent needs and wishes as and clarifying and defining their completely as possible, while trying http://dot.kde.org/2011/05/16/promo use, in addition to increasing the to find better ways to organize the -sprint-2011 visibility of help files with links in KDE development platform. the sidebar. WEBWORLD 2011 SPRINT, ESSEN Platform to Frameworks The rest of the attendees discussed 1-5 JUNE requirements for a new version of One of the primary results of Capacity, the custom PHP Platform 11 was gaining consensus Stuart Jarvis framework that powers kde.org and on making KDE's development platform more modular, with each In the beginning of June, nine other KDE websites. Work also library (or technology within it) contributors with an interest in began on designing the main clearly defined in its purpose and KDE's websites gathered outside kde.org site. This included a review how it can be deployed for use in a Essen in Germany at the world of the information that is needed on Qt or KDE application. The goals famous Linux Hotel. the front page and the adoption, in principle, of a new menu structure are to create a more maintainable Attendees included members of developed at the KDE Promotion set of libraries with higher quality, KDE's design, web, promotion, Team Sprint in April. to make KDE libraries accessible to UserBase and sysadmin teams, the current community of Qt This year's event featured 2 keynotes, a discussion panel and a • Solutions, variety of exciting talks relating to which four main tracks. These included implement managing your personal a full information with KDE software, an technology in-depth look at Qt/KDE community or stack, interaction, KDE on mobile devices, including a and tips for developing KDE library and software. The first day's keynote mandatory runtime LINUX IS TAKING OVER Platform 11 dependenci es. THE UNIVERSE BY developers, and to provide KDE with While there was certainly a lot of POWERING EVERYTHING a set of libraries that are well-suited highly technical content, there were for use in mobile and consumer also less technical moments that FROM MOBIILE PHONES electronic devices. The end result is helped draw members of the a shift from a "platform" to a set of community closer together. There TO AIR TRAFFIC integratable "frameworks". This is was a visit to scenic Zermatt, a reflected in what will be the name CONTROL SYSTEMS football (or soccer to the North for this next version of KDE's Americans) game and a football libraries and basic application from Jim Zemlin from the Linux runtime requirements: KDE tournament. One of the more memorable moments, however, Foundation discussed "The State of Frameworks. the Linux Union" and how Linux is came when David Faure grabbed taking over the universe by an entirely different sort of powering everything from mobile THE END RESULT IS A keyboard and shared his skills as phones to air traffic control systems jazz piano hacker. SHIFT FROM A and even the stock market exchanges. On the second day, "PLATFORM" TO A SET Trade Shows and Carol Smith's keynote focused on Community Events KDE's successes within the Google OF INTEGRATABLE Summer of Code program and how we could continue to expand "FRAMEWORKS". CAMP KDE 2011, SAN participation in the future. This FRANCISCO year's education panel covered All of the libraries and run-time 4-5 April tough questions on the most requirements in KDE Frameworks pressing issues relating to KDE's are being placed into one of three Justin Kirby presence in the world's classrooms. categories: The event was quite successful and Camp KDE 2011 was held April 4 many lessons were learned which • Functional Qt Addons, which and 5, 2011 in San Francisco, will be used to make next year provide a well defined purpose (e.g. California at the Hotel Kabuki. This even better. configuration management) and year the event was co-located with carry no additional runtime the Linux Foundation's Collaboration http://dot.kde.org/2011/04/13/re- dependencies other than Qt; Summit which took place April 6 live-camp-kde-experience and 7. Held annually in North • Operating System Integration, Qt America, Camp KDE provides a SOLUTIONS LINUX, PARIS Addons that can have operating regional opportunity for KDE system-specific dependencies to contributors and enthusiasts to 10-12 May provide their features (such as how gather and share their KDE Gaël Beaudoin a theoretical libktimezone would experiences. Co-location with the use ktimezoned on Linux but the Collaboration Summit gave Camp From May 10th to May 12th, the native API in Microsoft Windows); KDE attendees a unique opportunity Solutions Linux fair took place in to learn from and share their Paris. experiences with members of many other successful open source Geoffray Levasseur and Sébastien software projects. Renard (from KDE Francophone), KDE eV Community Report | Issue 17 | 1st Quarter, 2011 ev.kde.org/reports 7 Aurélien Gateau (of Gwenview We had a great time. Seeing KDE represented, as are experimental fame) and Gaël Beaudoin managed community members is always fun! projects about generative art, the KDE booth for the 3 days. experimental hardware and LIBRE GRAPHICS MEETING, algorithms. It's a friendly event: As usual we were next to our MONTREAL while there is a lot of friendly GNOME friends. With their 3.0 competiton between, for instance, 10-13 May release, lots of discussion happened Krita and MyPaint, there are no around their new major release and Lukáš Tvrdy & Boudewijn Rempt inter-project fights, no how it compares to the Plasma flamewars—just a lot of respect desktop now. We met many people In May, the Libre Graphics Meeting for everyone's effort. It would be new to desktop Linux; explaining (LGM) was held in Montreal, good if next year more KDE what the KDE community does to Canada. Thanks to the sponsorship graphics projects were present! new people is always refreshing. of KDE e.V., three members of the There were lots of old timers too, Krita team attended—Lukáš Tvrdý, Lukáš Tvrdý gave a presentation and the usual "What's new?" Timothée Giet and Boudewijn on the latest developments in question was a regular one. Rempt. Lukáš, Boudewijn and Krita, while Timothée Giet gave a workshop on painting with Krita. There were also some professionals Timothy represented KDE graphical Both presentations can be seen on asking for advice or developer applications at the conference, River Valley TV: contact for specific needs. And where most of the open/libre young people curious and eager to graphics world meets. http://river-valley.tv/krita- try the beautiful Plasma desktop, professional-digital-painting/ with the OpenSUSE DVD we were At the Libre Graphics Meeting giving away. We also made some users and developers of many free http://river-valley.tv/comic-book- people happy with the many graphics software projects get drawing-with-krita/ Kubuntu goodies. A few t-shirts together, meet and work together. were sold too, spreading the love! There are professional artists, university and and art college We even had time to spy the teachers, software designers and competition by helping demo the developers. Video, 2D and 3D GNOME Shell. Nobody noticed. graphics and desktop publising are
KDE eV Community Report | Issue 17 | 1st Quarter, 2011 ev.kde.org/reports 8 New Members
KDE e.V. is happy to welcome the following new members:
Emil Sedgh
Harald Sitter Finances KDE e.V. Board INCOME (€): Cornelius Schumacher Supporting membership fees: 13,575 President Randa meeting sponsoring: 2,800
AT THE END OF QUARTER 2, KDE E.V. HAD A POSITIVE BALANCE OF €221,230. CONTACT Note: The financial numbers provded here are approximations and are provided for informational purposes only. For a complete Website: ev.kde.org accounting record, please contact the KDE e.V. directly. Email: [email protected]
Report Prepared By Inu Kim Claudia Rauch Carl Symons Thanks to the many other members of KDE who contributed to this report.
IF YOUR COMPANY WISHES TO SUPPORT KDE, PLEASE VISIT THE SUPPORTING MEMBERS PAGE AT EV.KDE.ORG/GETINVOLVED/SUPPORTING-MEMBERS.PHP.
KDE is a registered trademark of KDE eV in the United States and other countries. Visit ev.kde.org for more information. Visual design by Eugene Trounev and Rob Oakes. Typeset using the ADF Universalis Font (arkandis.tuxfamily.org/adffonts.html).